


Eight Drinks In

by BloodStainsBlue



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Either way the ending isn't happy so buckle up, F/M, Heavy Drinking, I don't know what it'll be tho, If you guess who it is you get a prize!, Kairi is a sympathetic character in this, M/M, Non-Explicit Non-Con, Or Is It?, So if you're looking for a Kairi bashing fic this is not the one for you, The bartender in this is a character from another Square game, Unrequited Love, alcoholic character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-21
Updated: 2018-01-21
Packaged: 2019-03-07 14:10:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13436427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BloodStainsBlue/pseuds/BloodStainsBlue
Summary: “Best man in love with the bride? I see it all the time. It’s the biggest cliché in the book,” the bartender says, a light chuckle escaping his lips.“I would appreciate it if you didn’t refer to my struggles as a cliché,” Riku slurs, finishing the last of drink number six before processing what had occurred in their exchange and quickly adding on, “Also, that’s not what’s going on at all.”“What’s going on, then, if it’s not jealousy?”“I didn’t say it wasn’t jealousy."Riku gets drunk at Sora and Kairi's wedding. It doesn't go very well.





	Eight Drinks In

**Author's Note:**

> Big big big thanks to my girlfriend for beta reading this story for me! Check her out at CalicoNekoChi on both [Tumblr](http://caliconekochi.tumblr.com/) and on [here](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CalicoNekoChi/profile)! Without her, this would never have been posted so show her some love for me!

Riku has tried _so_ hard to be happy for the past six hours. He knows that’s how long it’s been because he glances at the nearest clock every chance he can, hoping that soon the festivities will die down and he can go home and get drunk _there_ instead of at his best friend’s wedding.

            He’d never felt such intense humiliation as when he’d been standing next to his best friend, watching him give himself to the love of his life with unbridled joy written clearly on his face. Perhaps worse than the humiliation was the shame Riku felt when a sick coldness bloomed in his stomach when he watched Sora’s lips press to Kairi’s, and he glanced down at his shoes, ignoring the light punch to his lower back from behind him, surely Tidus trying to tell him that he should _pretend_ to be happy for them and to be chosen as the best man, at least.

            He knew it was the least he could do, but he wasn’t able to manage it. The unnatural smile that he’d been wearing for the past hour had been burning his face, and he hadn’t even tried to hide his tears; he just lied and called them tears of happiness.

            He’d told himself before the day had begun that he would at least wait until he got home to start drinking, because he _knew_ he would need it, but he didn’t want to accidentally expose himself during Sora’s happiest day.

           

The reception had started and Sora and Kairi had the first dance of the night, and Riku quickly figured that he wouldn’t be able to handle it anymore—so he’d had his first drink.

            Tidus stayed with him to monitor him for a good while. He was the only one there who fully understood what Riku was going through, all thanks to a casual hook-up three years ago and a single slip, Sora’s name bursting out of Riku’s mouth in place of his actual partner. Tidus, for his part, had taken it pretty well, shrugged it off with a “Figured. Hey, no big.”

            “Don’t drink too much, man. We both know how you can get,” Tidus suggested when he saw Riku ordering his first drink while the sun was still blaring in the sky.

            “C’mon, I’m not an idiot. I can control myself, you know,” Riku argued, and maybe it was a strong mix, but just one would surely be enough to fight off the freezing cold grip that was tightening on his heart, something that was all too familiar and yet something he’d also thought he’d abandoned a long time ago.

            Three drinks later and Tidus had slid Riku a cup of water and wandered off with his first grip tight in his hand. Tidus was nervous—Riku could tell because he’d been worrying his lip with his teeth, and Riku thought he would start bleeding—and Riku knew that was his queue to stop, but he still downed his third drink and ignored the glass of water Tidus had left for him.

           

Now the sun is gone. The stars are beginning to break through the haze of day, still dull with the last clinging fight of the sun. Despite this, the celebrations haven’t stopped. Riku’s back is to everyone else, his eyes locked on the sandalwood bar in front of him, ignoring the happy chatter and dancing.

            He can hear Sora singing along to the music, and Kairi’s happy giggling. They’re both obviously drunk, and Riku’s eyes roll even as he smiles. Even as he’s upset, he can’t be _angry_ with them for finding and pursuing their happiness. He knows that _he_ could have done that, could have at least _tried_.

Sora had been so supportive when he’d come out to him, tackled him in a hug and saying, “Riku, you know I still love you! Is that what you were so scared to tell me?” Riku had been so caught up in pretending to be embarrassed and chagrined at the hug that he just nodded, forgot to tack on, “Well, not really, I’ve actually been in love with you since we were kids.” And by the time he’d finally worked up the courage to confess, so had Kairi, and Riku settled with being as proud and supportive of them as Sora had been to him.

            “In love with the bride, huh?” the bartender says, and Riku stops slowly rotating his glass back and forth, digging the perspiration left on the cup from the wood, and instead looks up at the bartender for the first time that night, really looks at him. He’s cute, Riku thinks in the back of his mind, short, lean but not wiry, pouty lips and a small nose that reminds Riku of a kitten or a bunny, even as he suspects that it’s fake.

            “What?” he asks, and for the first time that night he can hear how slurred his voice is, how blurry the rest of the world is outside of his direct vision.

            “Best man in love with the bride? I see it _all_ the time. It’s the biggest cliché in the book,” the bartender says, a light chuckle escaping his lips.

            “I would appreciate it if you didn’t refer to my struggles as a cliché,” Riku slurs, finishing the last of drink number six before processing what had occurred in their exchange and quickly adding on, “Also, that’s not what’s going on at all.”

            “Yeah, drink number seven over there says otherwise,” the bartender teases, mixing up another of the same, and Riku’s eyes fall as he realizes that he’s lost track of time and alcohol, that he _just finished_ drink number seven, and is being handed number eight. “What’s going on, then, if it’s not jealousy?”

            “I didn’t say it wasn’t jealousy,” Riku grumbles, and then curses, because his filter was clearly _gone_.

            “Oh? Now, this is even more interesting,” the bartender hums, takes away glass number seven and sets down glass number eight, leans over and peeks over at the dancefloor. “Can’t blame you. He’s cute.”

            “Yeah… yeah, he is,” Riku sighs, taking another drink and looking closely at the bartender again. His bangs hang down around his face, circling it in just the right way to make him look even more pretty. Riku finally notes the mascara that is clinging to his eyelashes.

            “You should probably go home though, man. Don’t know why people always insist on staying through the reception if they’re just gonna be sad at a wedding,” he says, and pushes off the bar again, cleaning Riku’s now empty glass.

            “Because he’d be sad if I left,” Riku responds, and it takes him a second to realize that he and the bartender had spoken in unison. “What?” he asks again, and he realizes he must sound like such an idiot.

            “I hear it all the time. That’s what happens when you always tend the sad bar at a wedding.”

            “The sad bar?” Riku asks, tilting his head in curiosity.

            “Paying attention?” the bartender asks, cockily raising his eyebrows and motioning near the dancefloor.

            Riku finally notes the second bar settled right next to the dancefloor—it’s crowded, people are laughing as the bartender elaborately makes people’s drinks, and no one loiters, everyone immediately running back to the dancefloor once they’ve gotten their fix.

            “I always tend the sad bar. Well, not _always_. But usually,” he says with a one shouldered shrug, and Riku curiously tilts his head.

            “Why would you want to do that?” he asks, drink number eight half-empty and forgotten.

            “Because alcoholics are fun and there’s always a cute guy who’s sad and needs a… shoulder to cry on,” he hums, setting the now clean glass down and leaning over the bar again.

            Riku can’t stop himself from glancing down at the long expanse of his neck, looks at his collarbone that juts out of his shirt, his skin’s a light, dusty shade of tan that’s common on the islands. “And which do you think I am?” Riku asks, his eyes returning back to the bartender’s.

            “You’d probably be surprised how often the two categories interact,” the bartender responds, his hand coming over to the cusp of Riku’s half empty glass, long fingers sliding it away. Riku lightly bristles at the implication but finds he’s not too angry at his glass getting dragged away, and so he supposes he can let it slide for the moment—he’s not there just yet.

“I’ve been on my feet for a few hours now. Wanna join me on my break?” the bartender purrs, reaching under the bar and setting a closed sign onto the wood, not that it seemed like anyone else would be joining them.

 

            The venue is large, but the bartender doesn’t drag him far anyway. He pushes him into what looks like an empty conference room, slams the door closed and pushes Riku against the table.

            He’s promptly on his knees, expertly working Riku’s belt open, pulling at his pants and boxers and taking him into his mouth. Riku’s mind is hazy, the whole room is spinning and unsteady, and although he feels a mouth on his most sensitive area, the blood barely rushes, but that doesn’t stop the young bartender from trying. Riku hadn’t realized just how drunk he w _as_ until he’d been pulled out of his seat, but now that he has been he wants nothing more than to sit down. He lets his fingers thread into the soft blonde hair beneath him, uses it to anchor him to reality.

            He doesn’t know how long it’s been, thinks it’s been a few minutes, his cock barely responding, before the door slams open with a pair of soft, playful giggles.

            The bartender’s mouth pulls off of Riku, leaving him cold and unfulfilled but silently relieved. “Excuse me, this room is occupied,” he says, and he hears Kairi clear as day, apologizing and saying, “C’mon, let’s go.”

            “No, wait,” says the second voice, and Riku looks up and sees Sora at the doorway, looking from Riku to the man on his knees in front of him. “Riku?” he asks, locking eyes with Riku’s, although Riku doesn’t seem to be fully acknowledging it, or even seem _aware_ outside of the knowledge that Sora is in the room and caught him like _this_.

            He knows how this must look, his own eyes clouded with drink, alone in a room with a man who looks as sober as ever. Sora’s eyebrows furrow in concern, and he says, “Hey, Riku, why don’t you come out with me, and we’ll get some fresh air.”

            Kairi seems to catch on at the same time Sora does, appearing to sober up almost immediately. “Hey, Riku, who’s this guy?” she asks, her hand falling off of Sora’s arm as she steps out from behind him and instead stands next to him.

            “Barten—”

            “None of your business, just go. We’re fine,” the bartender interrupts, standing up and gently resting his hand on Riku’s shoulder. “I asked him if he wanted to spend some time with me and he said yes. That’s between me and him.”

            “He’s _drunk_! Look, I don’t know who you are, but—”

            The anger in the room, it’s palpable, contagious, because then Riku feels it building in his own chest. “And who’s fault is that, Sora?” he shouts, reaching down to clumsily fix his pants and failing. “I don’t think you have any place to be worried about me right now!”

            Sora’s glance turns from the bartender who’s reaching down to put Riku away to Riku himself, his face falling but the anger is still present in the tenseness of his jaw and the lack of mirth in his eyes. “Don’t tell me not to be worried about my _best friend_. Riku, come on, I’ll take you home.”

            “No! Fuck you! I’m doing this because _I_ want to, and I’m not going to let you tell me I can’t! You have some nerve to get hitched with your fucking girl-toy—”

            “—Don’t fucking talk about Kairi like that—”

            “—Without even asking me how I _felt_ about it first, how I _felt_ about you—”

            “Riku, Sora, please!” Kairi shouts, resting her hands on Sora’s shoulders. This only provokes Riku, who reaches back for whatever he can find, grabs a vase that sits in the middle of the table and tosses it at the newlyweds. He feels that claw gripping at his heart again, feels it traveling down his arm, down towards his fingertips on the left, but doesn’t think anything of it.

            Kairi raises a simple shield, her eyes drawn to Riku’s arm at the same time Sora’s are. “Riku…” she whispers, stepping closer.

            “Stop! Just leave me _alone_!”

The bartender has backed off now and sits with his back against the wall, seeming to realize that he’s gotten himself involved in something that he _doesn’t_ want to be in the middle of.

            “Riku, just calm down!” Kairi shouts back, points at Riku’s arm, and Riku finally looks, seeing the Dark Aura building in the palm of his hand.

            As soon as he notices it it dies away, and he can’t believe what’s happened, what he was about to do. He falls into one of the chairs that sits around the conference table and lets his head fall.

            He hears Kairi say something, and lightly hears Sora’s footsteps as they rush out of the room.

            He’s apologizing profusely, repeating the words, “I’m sorry,” like they’re a mantra, doesn’t stop when Kairi pulls him into a hug, presses his head to her stomach, lets him rest his forehead there. He doesn’t stop when his arms come up and wrap around her waist, keeps apologizing to her and to Sora even though he’s not there anymore.

            “It’s okay. I’m not mad, Sora’s not mad,” she promises, petting his head, letting her fingers run through his hair, grown long again in the past few years.

            “You’re a fucking liar,” Riku lightly sobs, all malice gone from his words.

            “No, I’m not. Maybe wrong, but not a liar. You can ask Sora tomorrow,” Kairi whispers, and Riku feels himself relax at least slightly, because Kairi isn’t mad at him, and he knows this is why Sora loves her, and why she’s one of the few people who he’s always been able to call family.

            “It’s here,” Sora calls from the door, he hears a soft word escape from Kairi’s lips before he’s asleep in her arms.

****

            Riku wakes up the next morning to what feels like a sharp digging between his eyes, not helped by his curtains which sit wide open beside him.

            He’s confused for a moment, as he never opens his curtains for any reason, but it’s cleared up when he turns his head the other way and sees Sora sitting in a chair next to his bed, his eyes glued to the wall in front of him, his hands sitting on his lap.

            Riku slowly sits up, groaning in pain and bringing one hand up to shield his eyes from the sunlight. “Water and aspirin,” Sora says, and Riku looks from Sora to the nightstand next to him, a single glass of water and two pills resting on it.

            “Thanks,” Riku whispers, his voice hoarse from what he assumes was all of the screaming that he’d been doing the night before. Despite the horrible hangover, the events from the night before were still perfectly clear, looming over him and causing shame and guilt to bubble in his stomach.

            He takes the pills and gulps down the glass of water in seconds, setting them down in awkward silence. He looks over at Sora and sees that his facial expression seemingly hadn’t changed from the night before, his jaw clenched and eyes hard and angry.

            For minutes, they sit in uncomfortable silence, and Riku begins to worry that the shame will kill him before Sora even deigns him with a look. “That guy’s been dealt with,” Sora finally says, even as his eyes still avoid Riku.

            “Dealt with?” Riku asks, and he already suspects what the explanation is before Sora even gives it.

            “Kairi stayed behind while I took you home,” Sora explains, and they both know that’s all they need.

            “It really wasn’t… a big deal, it’s not like—”

            “Riku, what he did wasn’t okay.”

            “Sora, I’m f—”

            “I’m not arguing the specifics of rape with you right now, Riku!” Sora snaps, and Riku’s mouth closes before he can say anything else. “You should have gone home, so no one could hurt you, at least,” Sora huffs.

            Riku wants to argue that he’s not a _child_ and can take care of himself even though Sora surpassed him in skill long ago, but instead just settles with, “Yeah, I got that.”

            “I didn’t know it was this bad. Do you drink like this a lot?” Sora asks, and he finally looks back at Riku, the anger in his eyes replaced with worry.

            “No.”

            “That’s not what Tidus said when I asked him,” Sora lightly counters, and Riku groans and rolls his eyes, “Tidus said you remind him of Jecht.”

            “Yeah, he says that to me, too,” Riku grumbles, and suddenly he feels like he would prefer the awkward silence to having this conversation with Sora at this moment.

            “And yet you still do it,” Sora deadpans, tilting his head and raising his eyebrows.

            “You wouldn’t get it,” Riku grumbles and shakes his head.

            “But I do. First it was darkness. Now it’s alcohol. Yesterday, it was almost both,” Sora points out, and Riku flinches just as his words, hating that Sora’s gotten so emotionally perceptive in the last few years and blames most of it on Kairi’s influence.

            “I know it’s not a good idea,” Riku says with a deep sigh, “It’s not good for me. But it… helps.”

            “Helps. With what? Me?” Sora asks, and Riku’s head turns down to his bedsheets. His eyes begin to trace patterns into the blue cloth, anything to avoid looking at Sora as he repeatedly hits him with the truth. “You should have just told me, this could have all been avoided, but I guess it’s easier to not do anything and feel sorry for yourself about it,” Sora huffs.

            “No, I couldn’t!” Riku argues, looks up at Sora and says, “You don’t understand, Sora, I _love_ you! We can’t _have_ that!”

            “Yes we can! Could have! I _love_ you too, dummy!” Sora shouts, and Riku flinches again, his face falling as Sora’s words sink into his skin, the shame turning into humiliation.

            “But—but Kairi…”

            “I love Kairi, too! I love you both! But Kairi confessed first! I didn’t even fully realize it until last night,” Sora trails off, his hands clenching in his lap, “You’re so stupid sometimes, honestly!”

            Riku can’t help but wholeheartedly agree, and he feels tears of what-if sting his eyes.       

            “What’s done is done. I’m not going to divorce Kairi after a day because of what happened,” Sora says, and Riku wants to say that he doesn’t _want_ Sora to do that, even though he understands how unbelievable that would be coming from him after everything that’s happened, “This is what it is now. I’m sorry.”

            “No. No, _I’m_ sorry,” Riku says with a deep sigh. “I’m sorry I ruined your wedding.”

            “You didn’t _ruin_ it. It was really good until that last part,” Sora says, and a weight slowly lifts itself from Riku’s chest, and as he looks as Sora, he sees the same thing happen to him, his shoulders finally coming back up from their slump. “And I’m not referring to your temper tantrum,” Sora promises, and Riku barely avoids letting the budding tears fall.

            “I’m happy for you, really. I want you guys to work out.”

            “I know.”

            “You know I love Kairi, too. I want you guys to be happy together,” Riku whispers.

            “I know you do. So does she,” Sora promises, and slowly reaches his hand out, resting it on top of Riku’s.

            Riku looks down at their touching hands, and turns his hand over, threading their fingers together. “I’ll get help. I…I know I need it,” he says, and Sora nods.         

            “Good,” Sora says, giving Riku’s hand a soft squeeze.

            They sit like that for a few minutes, the silence more comfortable but still tense, before Sora stands up out of his chair. Riku doesn’t know what he expects, but Sora’s lips against his are not it. His eyes flutter closed as their mouths move together, and it comes so naturally that it makes Riku’s chest hurt even more, a glance at what could have been.

            Riku’s hand comes up to rest on the back of Sora’s neck, Sora lightly moans and brushes his tongue against Riku’s lips. Riku pulls away and turns his head to the window, gently sliding his fingers out of Sora’s grip. “Kairi,” he whispers, and Sora repeats it.

            “Yeah… right. Just… now it’s out of our system,” Sora says, and Riku’s eyes come up to meet Sora’s. He knows it’s not, but for a second there he _had_ him, and he thinks he can live with that.

            “I’m gonna make us some breakfast,” Sora says.

            “It’s not gonna be gummy bear pancakes, is it?” Riku asks.

            “Do you have gummy bears?”

            “I always have them here; I know you’re addicted.”

            “Then I think you already know the answer,” Sora says as he walks out, and Riku thinks that maybe now things can be normal.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks, guys, for reading! I know I sort of ghosted, but I'd like to keep up a regular-ish posting schedule from here on out? But anyways... comment, kudos if you liked it, or if you didn't let me know why! I appreciate all feedback, mostly because I'm an attention whore.  
> If you really liked it, or just wanna talk, say hi, stalk me, whatever, you can catch me on [Tumblr!](http://bloodstainsblue.tumblr.com/) I love you guys, you keep me going. Kisses! <3


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